


Learning Curve

by Bearfootscar



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Drabble, F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-17
Updated: 2013-10-17
Packaged: 2017-12-29 17:31:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1008132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bearfootscar/pseuds/Bearfootscar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In teaching Fenris how to read, Hawke teaches him sounds and letters.  She also inadvertently teaches him about the the meaning of love. No plot to speak of, but just some fluffy fluff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Learning Curve

**Author's Note:**

> In which I prove that I am capable of writing something other than angst.

Fenris elbowed Hawke and grumbled as they read together by the dying candle at her bedside table.  He squinted, or cocked his head, and sighed in frustration to signal that he needed her to speak a word for him.

She had tried to be more direct in her teaching, but after he had learned the letters and their sounds, he insisted on reading independently.  He had been unamused with the primers she had found in the market, firmly stating, "No, Hawke.  I am no child.”  Instead, Hawke had turned to Varric, who was kind enough to write Fenris some age appropriate material.  He had waded through Magic is Bad and The Slavers and the Void, and now he was working on The Elf and the Dragon--one of Varric’s epic tales depicting how a dashing elf named Fenris singlehandedly slays a high dragon at the Bone Pit to rescue a fair damsel.  

Now he was elbowing her to grab her attention, and she pulled her gaze from her own book (Varric’s latest serial--Bondage Bandits) to glance at the word he held a callused finger over.

“Fenris, you know that word, don’t joke,” she said with a sigh before turning her eyes back to the serial.  Things were starting to heat up between the bandits and their not-so-unwilling hostage, so she was eager to continue.  

“Hawke, I know how to read the word,” he said leveling his gaze on her.  

She felt his eyes searching her, but she shrugged without looking up. “Then why’d you ask?”

“I… I wish to know what the word means,” he said, dropping his eyes back to the book in his lap.  She watched as his finger came down to brush over the word as though to feel the pen strokes that made it.

She sighed and closed her book before turning to look at him.   _Maker, is he blushing?_ she thought and then looked down at the word under his fingertip again, her throat tightened into a knot as the air became too thick to breathe.  

The line read: “For the love of his fair lady.”

Love.  The word was love.  

Her gaze slowly moved up his finger, past his elbow, and up to his still downturned face.  His lips were pursed, his eyes cast aside so that his face was in the flickering shadow of the dwindling candlelight.

“I am not sure I know what it is to love,” he said, his voice so quiet that she might have missed the words entirely had she not been so near.

The words now freed, he turned to meet her eyes.  The glow of the fire radiated in his own, suffusing them with a golden hue that made her chest feel light and warm.

“Fenris, are you asking me to explain love to you?” The words came out unintentionally hard as they wiggled around the rock at the back of her throat.  

“No-- I-- Nevermind, Hawke,” he said, returning his gaze back to the page where his finger still worked against the ink of the word.

She swallowed hard to loosen the knot, then gently took hold of his hand from the page.  His finger was smudged with ink where he had rubbed it and, as she brought it closer to her face, she could see the faint tracing of the word “love” mirrored on the pad.  She brought it to her lips and pressed it there.

“I don’t mind.  Really,” she said.

His hand quivered a bit in her grasp, but he loosened it and brought it up to her face.  The corners of his mouth turned up into a smile as he brushed the inky finger along her cheekbone.

“There is ink on you,” he said with a smile, his eyes twinkling.

“Oh?  Where?” she asked, watching as his eyes flicked down to her lips where she imagined the word ‘love’ was again transposed. “Whatever will I do?” She feigned distress and fanned herself with her hand playfully.

“I could remove it for you.” He pulled her in close and brushed his lips against hers so lightly she thought perhaps they had not met at all.  Leaning in further, she slipped a hand behind his back and turned her lips up towards his again.  Indulging her, he tenderly kissed her bottom lip two more times then pressed his forehead against hers.  She could feel the tip of his nose against her own as the last vestiges of candlelight flickered its final warning.

“Fenris, you asked what love is.”

“Mmm,” he murmured deep in his throat such that she could feel his deep voice reverberating against her bones.

“This.  Right here.  This is love.” She let the words float from her lips into his ear before pressing them against his lips again.  

“I hoped you might say as much,” he said when she withdrew. “But I am, sadly, a slow learner and I am afraid that you will have to explain it to me again.”

“Just the once?” she smiled.

“Maybe more.  Shall we see how quickly I can learn?”  

She picked up the open book still in his lap and reached across him to set it on the bedside table where the candle chewed at its last bit of wick and melted its last bit of wax.  Then she puffed out the flame and settled back next to him.

“Repeat after me…” she said quietly as she parted her lips slightly and found his in the dark.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Another tremendous thank you to my perfect Betas: Lilou88 and NovaMarie. Without them, my writing would only make sense to a small population of baboons.


End file.
